Digests are finding aids that serve as a means of locating cases by subject. West Publishing, as a major publisher of federal and regional reporters, developed a unique subject classification of law known as the Key Number System and applied the classification to cases by creating editorial enhancements known as “headnotes.” “Headnotes” are paragraphs created by editors at West Publishing that summarize the important points of law discussed in a case and are assigned a number (“key number”) in the classification scheme. Digests arrange the “headnotes” of cases by subject in order to allow research by subject.
West published digests include a Descriptive-Word Index, a high detailed, alphabetically arranged subject index. The Descriptive-Word Index is often the best place to begin research when using digests. The Descriptive-Word Index provides citations to specific topics and key numbers in the digest.
West publishes separate digests for each reporter and for many states including Texas Digest. Digests are generally shelved directly after the related reporter. West has also published five series of federal digests, namely: (1) West's Federal Practice Digest, 4 th which provides coverage from 1989; (2) West's Federal Practice Digest, 3 rd which provides coverage from 1975 to 1988; (3) West's Federal Practice Digest, 2 nd which provides coverage from 1961 to 1975; (4) Modern Federal Practice Digest which provides coverage from 1939 to 1960; and (5) Federal Digest which provides coverage prior to 1939.
The Texas Digest, published by West Publishing, covers all reported Texas cases and all reported federal cases arising from federal courts in Texas . Digests are finding aids that serve as a means of locating cases by subject. West Publishing, as a major published of federal and regional reporters, developed a unique subject classification of law known as the Key Number System and applied the classification to cases by creating editorial enhancements known as “headnotes.” “Headnotes” are paragraphs created by editors at West Publishing that summarize the important points of law discussed in a case and are assigned a number (“key number”) in the classification scheme. Digests arrange the “headnotes” of cases by subject in order to allow research by subject.
Each West published digest includes a Descriptive-Word Index, a high detailed, alphabetically arranged subject index. The Descriptive-Word Index is often the best place to begin research when using digests. The Descriptive-Word Index provides citations to specific topics and key numbers in the digest.
Legal citations indicate how and when a particular legal resource has been cited along with indicating the kind of treatment a particular legal resource has received. Prior to the late 1990s, Shepard's Citations provided the only comprehensive legal citation service and remains the only comprehensive legal citation service available in print form. Shepard's Citations provide citation services for state and federal case law, constitutions, statutes, administrative rules and regulations, court rules, and law review articles. Shepard's Federal Citations provide legal citations for decisions reported in the Federal Reporter, Federal Cases, Federal Supplement, Federal Rules Decisions, Claims Court Reports, Court of Claims Reporter and Federal Claims Reporter. Shepard's Texas Citations provide legal citations for decisions reported in the South Western Reporter, Opinions of the Attorney General, and decisions arising from Texas courts reported in federal reporters.
Words & Phrases is a multivolume set containing approximately 600,000 alphabetically arranged judicial definitions of legal and non-legal terms. Under each term, the cases with a judicial definition of the term are arranged by court and a citation to the case defining the term is provided.